We are a busy rural GP Training Practice with four doctors and a GP Registrar. Our main surgery is at Cheriton Bishop and our Branch surgery at Christow. Our Practice Area covers approximately 80 square miles with 12 villages around the beautiful landscape in and around the Dartmoor National Park.

Our Aim

Our aim is to give a personal, caring, efficient and friendly service to all our patients. This not only includes the management of acute illness, but a proactive, holistic and sensitive treatment of all chronic diseases, and a fully structured preventative health program for all age groups.

If you need medical help and your GP practice is closed, please call the NHS 111 number. The call is free from landlines and mobiles. When you call 111 an adviser will ask you questions to find out why you are calling and give you advice or direct you to the appropriate service.

For health needs that are not urgent, you should call your GP. If a health professional has given you a number to call for a particular condition, you should continue to call that number. You should call 999 in an emergency.

NEWS

Christmas…. Hoorah

We are open as usual this holiday period apart from the bank holidays. Therefore we are open until 6pm on the 22nd. Open again 8am on the 27th. Closed again only on New Years Day.

We all wish everybody a very Happy Christmas.

FLU VACCINES

We still have some flu vaccines left. So if you are in an at risk group then please don't hesitate to book an appointment.

We are compiling a list of resources both local and further afield in order to help everybody find the right services and information for health and well being. Further down this page there are links to these sites. The information on these sites is hugely useful and diverse so please give it a go.

We have been joined by our new registrar Dr Thea Collins. She started in August and will be with us for a year. She is in her final year of post graduate GP training and it is our pleasure to have her with us to complete this part of her training. She is an experienced doctor and has already become part of the team. She has appointment surgeries on all days apart from Wednesday, so please feel free to book with her.

Our past trainees

Dr De Courcy has sadly left to start her final post graduate GP year in Exeter. We wish her well. Dr Omali Abeywardena is now in hospital posts for the next 12 months.

Dr Bethan Woodfield has now fully qualified as a GP, and we wish her every success with her new career. Some hopefully will remember Dr Beth Timmins who has now been practicing as a GP for a year since she left us. She has a new baby girl, who is very well and will be resuming her GP career in the autumn.

Winter Viruses

Please find below some self help info for the seemingly more virulent upper respiratory viruses that are around this year. As always we are happy to see you any time but try this first:-

The complex care team (a team comprising physios, occupational therapists, GP’s, district nurses and numerous other services including Acorn) based in Crediton, provide a multidisciplinary support to vulnerable patients in our community. Over the last year there have been running balance courses. As patients have come to the end of this course an on going group is being set up at Christow and Cheriton bishop. If you or others that would like to be involved please contact the practice for more information.

The PPG and Practice report to the CCG 2014/15 is available on the PPG pages or follow the link below

Thank you very much to all who have submitted forms for the test and we are proud and pleased to say that all people would recommend us to their friends and family. This is no less than what we would aspire to.

Please fill the forms in (found at any surgery or dispensary) after any contact with our services and feel free to answer the supplementary question. The answers will be published by NHS England monthly.

If you would like to answer these questions then please follow the link below, and as always thank you very much for your help, input and support.

We feel it important to evaluate our services regularly and engage in staff training across the board. In order to do this we will close the surgery for an hour at lunchtime every two months. At this time the practice will be staffed for emergencies and the phones manned.

Also four times a year the practice (and all Mid-Devon practices) have a training afternoon which will be covered by the on call services for emergencies. In these cases medicines will not be able to be collected from either dispensary. The main site dispensary will open however from 5-6pm.

We offer not only a simple and easy online way to order prescriptions but the opportunity on-line to view and book your appointments, and the ability to view your medication, allergies and immunisation schedule. Coupled with this is the ability to look at your notes in more detail including coded entries and results.

In order to access this service please bring photo ID and speak to one of the receptionists or dispensary staff. As you will understand for confidentiality purposes this needs to be done in person.

A simple registration process will then give you this access.

Follow the link above

Step One supports people to fulfil their potential through specialist employment, mental health and supported living services.

Lots of information on how to become healthier and ways to make it happen

Pinpoint thousands of local and community services across Devon

USEFUL LINKS TO MANY LOCAL SERVICES

ACORN COMMUNITY SUPPORT

Acorn is a local and invaluable support servicethat provides services to the elderly and vulnerable in our practice area. They have the clear objective of reducing isolation and improving wellbeing. Click here for more information….

Without this service many vulnerable people will see a deterioration in their social and medical wellbeing.

Volunteers are always needed. Please see the link above for information.